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Category: Other Folks Cooking

If you cook well at home, like watching food porn shows on the tube, appreciate the truly amazing diversity of food in stores these days, or own great cookbooks, you owe a big thanks to Julia Child.

And just for the record, those of you old enough to recall the infamous Dan Aykroyd Saturday Night Live skit should know that Julia loved it so much she kept a copy cued up in her VCR and showed it to everyone. Ever after, she would chime in with “Save the liver!” as a favorite non sequitur.

This daughter of a wealthy California family came to cooking rather late in life. After serving with the OSS in World War II and meeting her husband Paul Child, they were transferred to Paris with the State Department in 1948. Introduced to good French food, she was transformed by sole meunière, a classically simple dish of fish in brown butter and lemon. Suddenly, a woman who’d had little interest in food or cooking through the first thirty some years of her life couldn’t get enough of either. She began training in formal French cooking at Le Cordon Bleu, but ran afoul of the Ameriphobic headmistress and never graduated. In the process of immersing herself in all things cuisine, she met Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholde, and Les Trois Gourmandes was born, the wellspring that lead, some ten years later, to volume one of Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Roughly two years later, The French Chef was born on WGBH in Boston, my home town. The rest is, as the saying goes, history. Literally every cooking channel, show, and even the way most cookbooks are laid out owes its existence to Julia Child. Yes, there were others, before and during her rise, but none came even close to plowing the row like she did.

I grew up watching Julia do her thing; my folks were pretty darn cosmopolitan, and appreciated good food and the cooking of it. My mom encouraged my desire to learn to cook, so Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Irma Rombauer’s Joy of Cooking, and James Beard’s American Cookery became culinary touchstones for me.

With Julia, what you saw was who she was and what you got, whether you saw her on TV, read her books, or met her live and in color. Through all the years of The French Chef, her number and address were published in the phone book; if you called or just dropped by, you were more likely than not to get Julia herself, and to find yourself in a conversation or her kitchen. She was famously irreverent, even on air, always finding a way to casually toss anything that she deemed useless over her shoulder, to crash a la Monty Python on the floor behind her. And yes, she did once note of pasta right out of the pot, “These damn things are as hot as a stiff cock.” She charged forward with indomitable energy from day one to her final hour, her spirit rarely anything but full bore.

Here’s my personal tie and case in point, why to this day I love that woman with a passion. My mom was a very successful artist in the Boston scene. Every year, she contributed works to the annual WGBH fundraising drive, which were held as televised auctions. In ’68, I went with her to “The Pru,” the Prudential building where the events were held and filmed, to drop off artwork. Lo and behold, there was Julia Child, in the flesh. Mom told me to go say hello, and I did. Julia gave me that trademark smile, shook my hand, asked my name; I told her I loved her show and liked to cook. She asked what my favorite thing to make was, and I told her macaroni and cheese. She asked how I made it, and listened intently as an eight year old explained how it was done. She allowed that my recipe sounded very nice, and made a suggestion about cooking and “stretching” the roux for best results, said “Nice to meet you, Dearie” in her trademark warble, and went on her way. I still do the roux exactly as she explained it to me.

Our friend Lee Ancheim hails from British Columbia. We knew right when we met that she was a fellow lover of good food, local sourcing, preserving, and eating wisely.

We have added a link to Lee’s new food blog, I Want Vegan, to the list on the right side of the page. Now, you’ve got us here and our fish and game oriented cousin, bigwildfood.com, plus my Sis Annie Lovejoy for vegetarian and vegan, Lee’s new blog, and our mutual friend Holly O’Reilly’s predominantly gluten free blog for additional perusing.

Del sent a comment on the prior post, to whit;“Maybe you’ll know the answer here but I’m wondering about the use of black beans in a dish referred to as Tex-mex. No bean of that sort has ever crossed the door of any cook on the Tejano side of my family. I’m wondering if it’s a difference of where in Mexico (ones) family originated or if pinto beans were all they found when they got to Texas so that’s what became traditional.
One side of the Mexican heritage in my family came from San Luis Potosi in 1917 and the other side varies from those who came to Texas direct from the Canary Islands in the 1500s to those with origins in all parts of northern Mexico.
No black beans anywhere there or in the family owned small restaurants that we favor. We do see them some in the upscale places (when I get forced into going to them) and in the ones that feature seafood from the central and south gulf coast.
Thoughts?”

(Slightly edited for content, because I can)

It’s an interesting question, indeed. And what a sad, sad thing, to be without frijoles negros in ones life…

First off, I’ll say without hesitation that we’ve had black beans in a bunch of Tex Mex joints in Texas, in the same neck of the woods as Del; what does that say, other than that we apparently don’t go to the same places? Not much.

Next, let’s look at the regions where Del’s people came from.

In the dominant cuisine of the central Mexican El Bajio region where San Luis Potosi is located, the pinto is and was more common than black beans, by far.

And those Canary Island roots are another great melting pot cuisine. Influences of the native Guanche people have blended with the ruling Spanish, as well as the cuisines of African and Latin American slaves and workers. There are beans and bean dishes there, but it’s as likely to be Ropa Vieja made with garbanzos as it is any other dish or variety. So, no big black bean influence there, either, (Albeit there are ‘native’ varieties in Spain and Portugal).

That said, my rather extensive studies of Mexican cuisine indicate that, in fact, black beans are quite common in Mexico, but more so by far in the south than the north and on the east coast more than the west. If you read Mexican regional cookbooks by genuine experts, you’ll find both black and reds in profusion. That said, the regional variations in Mexican cookery are easily as complex as Italian, Spanish, or French cuisines, and anyone who says otherwise is just plain wrong.

Black beans were indeed brought north and integrated into Tex Mex cooking from the get go to some degree, (They’re also common in New Mexican, Caribbean, and Cuban cooking). For my mind, the predominance of the pinto or chili bean en El Norte is likely more driven by gringo taste than by Tex Mex cook’s preferences; the black bean is a relative new comer as a commonly legume en Los Estados Unidos; the reds have been around far longer.

Regardless, cuisines including Tex Mex are rarely static; they evolve and that is a good thing. To some degree, I question the term “authentic” quite often; I mean, technically, ‘Confit’ means meat cooked in oil, and only meat. As such, when Daniel Boulud features a ‘tomato confit’ as part of a dish, is that not authentic?

So, where do Black Turtle beans, as they’re formally known, (as well as Black Magic, Blackhawk, Domino, Nighthawk, Valentine, and Zorro), come from? After all, that’s the real crux of the debate, isn’t it? According to El Universidad Autónoma Agraria Antonio Narroas in Saltillo, Mexico, and as fate would have it, Phaseolus vulgaris were first cultivated around 7,000 years ago in… Central America and Mexico.

The bottom line to me is this; if you make it and you like it, you can call it whatever you like, and use any color bean that floats your boat.

Attention Bellinghamsters and music lovers!
Here’s your chance to check out our new digs and hear some fantastic music.
Grammy nominated Singer-Songwriter Holly Figueroa O’Reilly is here for a house concert, Saturday, June 15th at 7 pm.
Tickets are $12 in advance, $15 at the door. Space is limited, so get yours now and join us for a great night!
Contact me here, or at ebena@sbcglobal.net to reserve or for more info.

I’ve enjoyed Michael Ruhlman since I first saw him in an episode of Bourdain’s first show.

I’ve heard folks say they find him arrogant, but I can’t agree; to me, arrogance is attitude without substance, and whereas Ruhlman has plenty of attitude, he certainly does not lack substance.

I loved his Chef series of books, found them fascinating page turners in fact.

Now he has turned his attention to sharing more of what he’s learned, as opposed to profiling others.

I use his Ratios application a lot; it’s a good common sense 21st century tool.

I’ve just finished reading his latest book, Ruhlman’s 20, and again, this is a great book, full of sound, practical advice and some great recipes as well. No matter how much or how little you cook, you’ll find useful stuff here. Probably the best synopsis of what makes pro chefs better than us, in a format that makes what they know and do very accessible for you and I.

Right now, you can get the Kindle version of the book for three bucks and change; that’s stupid good. Go grab a copy and dig in!